KALAMAZOO -- The cost of teachers' benefits is rising to the forefront of the debate over a May ballot request to renew a 1.5-mill tax for Kalamazoo County school districts.

School officials say they need the renewal because state funding for K-12 education has lagged behind inflation for years, forcing continual rounds of budget cuts.

Cutting off the local tax revenue would make the situation even more dire, they said.

Tax opponents say it's hard for districts to cry poverty considering the benefit package they provide to employees, which includes a health-care plan known for its comprehensive coverage and hefty price tag.

School officials "need to make tough decisions about what they're going to do to solve the problem," said Marty Dodge, a senior vice president for the Kalamazoo Regional Chamber of Commerce. "I think the easier solution has been to come to voters and ask for more money than to try for the tougher solution."

But chamber President Steward Sandstrom said Dodge's comments "don't speak for the chamber" and that the organization is not taking a stance on the tax request.

Sandstrom said he agrees the cost of school-employee benefits needs attention, but questions whether voting against the millage request would solve the problem.

"If (business people) have an issue with teacher benefits, then let them address that issue by running candidates that support their position," said Ron Kitchens, chief executive officer of Southwest Michigan First, the county's economic-development agency. "But don't do it by punishing children."

Kitchens said failure to renew the levy would be "economic suicide," derailing the county's efforts to revitalize its economy by becoming the Education Community.

"I'm shocked that any business person would say that we shouldn't invest in (children) as a renewable resource," Kitchens said. "You cannot save your way to prosperity -- it doesn't work in the education system."

School officials said tax opponents are mounting a disinformation campaign that ignores recent state reforms and local cost-saving measures, and are incorrect in suggesting that schools' financial problems are easily solved through changes in benefit plans.

"I agree more health-care reforms are needed, but there's not enough savings there to allow us to lose $3.8 million in funding," Kalamazoo Public Schools Trustee Tim Bartik said of the money KPS would receive next year through the local tax if it's passed.

"The reality is, if you're voting against the millage, you're voting for significant cuts in real services."

The tax request is on the May 6 ballot in nine school districts: Kalamazoo, Portage, Climax-Scotts, Comstock, Galesburg-Augusta, Gull Lake, Parchment, Schoolcraft and Vicksburg.

The levy costs the homeowner of a $120,000 house about $90 a year, and each district gets $335 per student.

Employee benefits are schools' fastest-rising expenditure. Last year, pension and insurance costs comprised almost a quarter of operating expenses in the nine districts.

But school administrators bristle at the suggestion they've ignored the issue. They say they've led the fight in Lansing to overhaul the Michigan Public School Employees Pension System and to make it easier to obtain competitive bids on health care.

Those reforms were finally adopted last fall.

"Between retirement and health care, we've been yelling about this for 10 years," said David Hutton, superintendent of Comstock Public Schools. "Nobody wanted to touch it."

Hutton and other superintendents said local districts shouldn't be punished for pension costs set by the state.

They also say they're already moving to control health-care expenditures -- between 2003-04 and 2006-07, the collective insurance bill for county school districts rose by 24 percent compared to a 31 percent average increase for health-insurance premiums nationwide.

All nine school districts insure their teachers through the Michigan Education Special Services Association, or MESSA.

MESSA is controversial because it is an affiliate of the Michigan Education Association, the state's largest teachers union.

Its policies are comprehensive but costly: Family coverage for Portage, Comstock and Schoolcraft teachers is more than $16,000 a year, compared to the national average of $12,100 for an employee-sponsored family plan.

But Bartik and others said it's a mistake to think taxpayers would reap large cost-savings if districts left MESSA.

Districts such as Climax-Scotts and Vicksburg already pass along the extra cost of MESSA, making it a moot issue for taxpayers.

A Vicksburg teacher, for instance, pays almost $6,000 out of his or her own pocket toward insurance premiums.

Climax and Parchment teachers will have to pay next year's MESSA increases out of their own pockets.

In other districts, including Kalamazoo and Portage, teachers have taken smaller wage increases to keep MESSA. Portage teachers, for instance, had a 0.5 percent increase in base pay this year and KPS teachers had a 1.5 percent base increase.

Since those districts look at total compensation in union negotiations, the trade-off for less-expensive insurance would be higher wages.

"I disagree with the idea that you could save huge amounts in health care without a change in wages," Bartik said. "The only way to do that is to cut total compensation to teachers, which flies in the face of reason."

Bartik points to research indicating that, after student sociodemographics, teacher quality is the most important factor affecting student achievement.

"So the idea that we could solve school funding problems by just lowering compensation for teachers, I don't think that is desirable," Bartik said.
Comparing Michigan

State Rep. Lorence Wenke, R-Comstock, who says he's inclined to vote against the education tax, is among those who would lower teacher compensation.

"We are a very generous state," Wenke said, noting that Michigan teachers are among the best-paid in the country. "You would think that a state with outstanding pay and benefits would have outstanding results, but we're just average with results. You need to keep that in mind. There's a lot of things that influence education besides dollars."

Education Week published a state-by-state analysis in January that compared teacher pay to 16 other occupations, including journalists, nurses, computer programmers and accountants.

But local educators said teacher salaries in southwestern Michigan are lower than state numbers suggest. All nine Kalamazoo County districts are below the Michigan average for teacher pay and five are below the national average, they said.

Moreover, the ground is shifting for Michigan teachers.

A recent report by the National Education Association study ranked Michigan 49th among the 50 states in teacher pay increases since 1995. Only Alaskan teacher salaries are growing more slowly.

In addition, in reforms adopted last fall, the Legislature trimmed pension benefits for new school employees and made it more difficult for current employees to obtain retiree health care if they retire before age 60.

The state also now requires school districts to obtain competitive bids for health insurance.

Ray Wilson, spokesman for the Kalamazoo County Taxpayers Association, which opposes the education tax, said still more reforms are needed.

"The voters need to hold the public school bureaucracy's feet to the fire by turning down the tax and forcing change," Wilson said.

Climax Superintendent Geoffrey Balkam said the changes that Wilson advocates already are occurring in his district.